Insurrectionary war raged in the provinces, particularly the stubborn war of La Vendee, and certain loyal fortresses like Caen managed to resist capture.
It was thus as a prisoner of the royalist faction, and quite out of touch with worldshaking events, that our young hero Chevalier Maurice de Vaudrey lived through the earlier period of the Revolution.
A love-message from him through Picard to Henriette––an unsuccessful attempt to escape; a glimpse of the still handsomely frizzed and powdered head gazing through trefoil Gothic window on the outer sunshine and liberty:––such is all that we may see of de Vaudrey’s strangely trussed up life during this time.
He was still enshrined in the heart of the little seamstress in the Paris faubourg, still dear to his aunt the Countess who with her 137 husband was an emigre beyond the borders. Otherwise, no hermit nor solitary was more completely effaced from the world.
The first light of hope was brought to Caen by a messenger from the Countess, who had managed to smuggle through a letter or two and a small box of gold.
“I dare not advise you,” his kind Aunt wrote. “Escape into France would invite your death as an aristocrat. On the other hand, if you make use of the accompanying pardon signed by your uncle the Count, the Governor of Caen will probably enroll you for the inhuman and useless war of La Vendee. Take the money, my dear Nephew, and use it as you deem best––the messenger will secure it for you outside the prison until you need it!”
De Vaudrey pondered, as his Aunt advised. But, really, there was but the one course for him! To win through, disguised, at whatever peril, to Henriette; to find her and Louise; to save them from that black welter of the Revolution, and guide them out of the country to the loving care of the Countess and the repentant Count: yes, such was the course that both Love and Duty dictated. He would begin it that 138 night, aided by his faithful friend the messenger.
“Hand part of the gold,” he whispered the Countess’s agent, “to some rustic carter on whom you can rely. Bring another part here and give it to a keeper whom I shall point out to you!”
The impromptu little plot worked perfectly. The friendly keeper, having gotten a peep at the ex-Police Prefect’s letter of pardon, needed but the clincher argument of the gold in order to aid de Vaudrey’s escape. A rope over the wall, and even a plank across the moat, were mysteriously provided. In the last silent watch of the night, the go-between (who had been waiting) conducted the escaped prisoner to the carter’s cavern. Already the East was showing the ghostly light of the first faint streaks of dawn.
Having breakfasted in the cave and put his few belongings into a pack, de Vaudrey with the two others stepped out of the dark hole into the growing light.